The 2nd meeting of the International Health Regulations (IHR) Emergency Committee concerning MERS-CoV, convened by the WHO Director General with a new special advisor added (Ms Karen Tan, Senior Director, Public Communication Division, Ministry of Communications and Information, Singapore) and several affected State Parties (France, Germany, Italy, Jordan, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Tunisia and the United Kingdom) on a party line, unanimously decided not to declare a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).
The Committee will reconvene in September, or earlier if needed. By September we'll have given the MERS-CoV every chance to spread by providing it with millions of people to jump to, from wherever it comes, at the hottest zone of infection, the KSA. If cases do not take off after the Hajj, one would think the immediate risk for a MERS-CoV pandemic would drop significantly.
Based on these views and the currently available information, the Director-General accepted the Committee�s assessment that the current MERS-CoV situation is serious and of great concern, but does not constitute a PHEIC at this time.
